


Homeward

by mothfloss, Oculi



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Bad things happen but so do good ones, F/F, F/M, Feferi launches a coup au, I will add tags as they become relevant - Freeform, M/M, Multi, The trolls are all on the same page and that page is revolution, games of thrones but homestuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2020-06-03 19:14:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 14,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19470379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mothfloss/pseuds/mothfloss, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oculi/pseuds/Oculi
Summary: Traditionally, Heiresses go to meet the Empress in single battle, to earn their throne or die trying. Traditionally, those Heiresses die before their final adult pupation. Feferi is, however, not very traditional.Or: Feferi launches a coup, a civil war ensues.





	1. The Party: Heiress I

**Author's Note:**

> I can always be found at [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) or my main at [SocialMediaSocrates](socialmediasocrates.tumblr.com) if you'd like to drop a line in my inbox! Anon is always open!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to Homeward. It's been a long time coming. I'll try to make regular updates but lmao we'll see. Tentatively, updates will be on Wednesdays. You can find me as i-am-mothfloss on tumblr for more shenanigans.

When the doors of the White Palace opened, Feferi wondered if the entire Empire had shuddered along with her. 

She had lived all of her short life in the Beacon Beneath the Waves, the Citadel built by the First Empress, the place that the invasion of the land had launched from. Feferi knew cold, the chill of the Depths was her oldest and best friend. But the halls of the White Palace were a different sort of cold entirely. 

The click and clack of her footsteps on the polished stones sounded far too loud, bouncing and echoing off the dusty walls, and the few glimpses she got of her reflection in the floor looked...odd. Off. Distorted. If she turned around, she knew her companions would be just a few feet behind her, but it seemed to her that she was all alone with her noisy footsteps and the shadows pooling just outside her field of vision. She’d heard rumors that Faedra, the Third Empress, had dabbled in witchcraft somewhere in the belly of the White Palace. That the Architect of the Empire had unleashed something terrible and lurking into its halls. 

Honestly, she’d believe it. 

“The Empress really has taken excellent care of the place,” Sianos, the newest member of her ever-expanding inner circle, drawled from her left, “the cobwebs and mildew are _charming ._ ” 

“Goddammit, Si, why can’t you ever shut up for a few minutes?” There was Eridan, grumbling. “This is sacred ground, you fucking ponce.” 

Sianos’s short, barking laugh broke most of the spell of the place. The chill retreated, if only a little, the shadows shrank back; when Feferi finally looked down, her reflection in the floor was normal and clear. 

And then she realized that she was standing at the doors of the Great Hall. 

Millennia and an Empire ago, the Court of Dreams had gathered here. She wondered if the stones remembered the music that had been played here, the balls that had been hosted. If she found the right part of the Hall, would it show her the moment the Prince in the North and the Grand Duchess had locked eyes? 

‘ _Stone remembers, little Heiress,'_ her lusus had warned her before she left the Citadel, ‘ _stone never lies.’_

She looked back, finally, at the two other seadwellers she’d chosen to accompany her to begin her coup. 

Sianos Anapos, she was still uncertain of. He was long and made of lean, hard lines and sharp-toothed smiles, and he’d come to her all on his own. ‘ _I’ve heard rumors about you,’_ he’d said, like that explained a single thing about anything, ‘ _I_ _like to test rumors myself.’_

It had turned out that Sianos heard a lot of rumors. He had a keen ear for whispers and a good eye for stolen communications; the others hadn’t exactly liked him being added to their circle (“ _Thirteen’s a bit of a crowd, Princess,”_ Vriska had chided her, “ _not that twelve wasn’t one, anyway.”_ ), but he brought vital information with him, and so here he was. 

Eridan, on the other hand, was proven, if grumpy, and sometimes disagreeable. He shifted around from foot to foot, squinting into the shadows like he’d find the ghosts there if he just looked hard enough. 

“Nobody ever started a coup from a hallway, Fef,” he groused, “you need to open the doors.” 

She turned back to the doors and rubbed at the dust on them with her fingertips, first. The story went that they were made of obsidian that the First Empress had taken from the Black City, that they were impervious to fire because of this. There were a lot of stories about the White Palace. The chill of the rock under her hand made her wonder if there was maybe a grain of truth to that one. 

Beneath the grime, she could make out the etchings of a dragon and a crowned trident that she’d seen in her dreams for the better part of half a sweep. She flattened her hand against them and pushed hard. 

The doors resisted a little, at first, but they swung open with a loud creak with a little persistence. Sianos made some joke about kicking the damned things in being a better way to go, and Eridan shot a withering glare his way and launched into a lecture on respecting the White Palace, you oily little bastard, but Feferi barely heard any of it. 

There before her, under a thick film of dust and dead bugs, was the Imperial Throne. 

The last Empress that had sat on it was the same one that Feferi had named herself for, the Fourth Empress, Mother of the Empire. Honestly, she’d half expected the rumors that the Condescesion had commanded the destruction of the Throne to be true. It had seemed like the sort of bitch move her Ancestor would pull. But the Throne was whole and undamaged (albeit _gross_ and _dirty_ ), and she figured the golden trident that made its back would be nice and shiny again after a good polishing. 

“-honestly, who or what raised you to be such a little shit?” Eridan continued as she approached the Throne. “Stop interrupting-” 

“Eridan,” she cut off his lecture impatiently, “is Karkat en route?” 

“Well he claims to be, at least.” 

“Good.” 

She ran a hand over the smooth marble of one of the Throne’s arms, then turned to take in the Hall in its entirety. There could be a Court of Dreams here again. _Her_ Court of Dreams. 

“Calling the banners, are we?” Sianos asked, and laughed. “Declaring the Sixth Empire to the ghosts first?” 

“We have to declare it to someone.” She took in the heavy, dark curtains over the floor-to-ceiling windows around the Hall’s perimeter. “But let’s open the windows, first.” 


	2. The Party: Heretic I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hijinks, extras, deleted scenes, and previews for Homeward are posted over on [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) !

Gamzee smelled the River Acheron before he saw it.

It roared its course through and around the Black City, smelling of sulfur and charcoal and the End of Things. The heat slammed into him like a solid wall not long after the smell reached him, so sudden and violent that he stumbled, and then the crackle and pop of flowing fire. He staggered and crawled until he reached the top of the hill, jagged shards of obsidian digging into his palms and knees.

And then it was there. The River of Woe. 

It was one of the twin rivers that formed the boundary of the Southern Carnival, and, somewhere beyond it, Death Herself ruled from the Throne of Night in Her Black City. If he closed his eyes long enough, he could almost hear ghosts whispering on its shores. Or maybe that was just his nerves.

Long and long and longer ago, the first Makara Grand Highblood, Geth’ha, had bathed in the Acheron and emerged unscathed, approved by the Messiahs to lead the West. The legend said that the river had spoken to Geth’ha, imparted doctrine that he’d brought back to his Carnival, and that it would do the same for any it deemed worthy. Since then, many of their kind had gone into its fires seeking enlightenment, answers, the enigmatic words of the prophets. All but Geth’ha had emerged disfigured, burned and ruined, doomed to belong to the river.

The Acheron was alive, and it didn’t surrender anything easily.

That was the story, at least. Gamzee had learned it first at Mother’s knee in the North. And Mother could be kind of dramatic.

He hadn’t sent word ahead of his arrival, wasn’t really his style, but the Burned Men were waiting. Waiting and watching, dozens of pairs of eyes on him as he picked his way across the scorched, rocky bank down to the shore of the river. They didn’t say anything, and he didn’t say anything, they all just stood there for what felt like an eternity. Gamzee locked eyes with the Burned Man that stood closest to him. The moon climbed higher in the sky, nearly obscured by the dancing light of the Acheron. He finally checked his watch. It had been two minutes.

This idea had seemed much better in his dreams.

He took a long, deep breath, or tried to, and then doubled over coughing. His eyes watered and his lungs burned, and he was, for a moment, pretty motherfucking certain his ribs would break before he ever went ahead with anything. He imagined himself crawling back to his hive and booting up his husktop to let his friends know he’d broken his ribs before the river ever lapped at his toes. Vriska would laugh at him for days, Feferi would be disappointed, and Gamzee? Gamzee would probably die of shame, his ruined ribs digging into his lungs while Feferi launched her coup without him.

Eventually, though, the coughing did subside, his lungs did clear, and his ribs remained whole, so he figured he would probably have to just get it over with, after all. Dying of shame would be a laugh and a half, probably, but he had shit to do.

He thought of his people, waiting for him to return in the West.

He thought of his Ancestor, old and mad, holed up in the Court of Miracles like a dying dragon.

Yeah, he would have to just get this over with.

He took a much shorter, far shallower breath, and stepped into the Acheron.

Nothing in his dreams or the stories had warned him that it wouldn’t just burn him (and it  _ did _ burn him; as soon as it lapped at the bottoms of his feet, he bit back a scream as his skin blistered and boiled and then, mercifully, went cold), it would  _ grab _ him. The further into the river he waded, the more it grasped at his legs and tried to drag him under. He took one long stride after another, the current swirling and snatching at him, and nearly lost his balance more than once. By the time it reached his knees, his legs screamed for him to turn back. By the time it reached his hips, the pull was too strong for him to fight any longer. So, he didn’t. He let himself go limp and collapsed into the river’s embrace.

The Acheron pulled him under; he didn’t bite back this scream, but it was carried away as fire filled his lungs.

He was burning and melting and boiling from the inside out. His heart thudded in his ears, slower and slower every moment, and his lungs burned until he couldn’t feel them anymore, and a slow-burning ember built itself in his gut. The river dragged him down toward its bed, and his skin danced away in ribbons everywhere it touched, pale and wavering and then gone. He got a brief glimpse of the blistered, blackened wreck of his arms, for just a moment, before he squeezed his eyes shut as they began to melt out of his skull. But the fire danced across his eyelids and forced them open and showed him a world gone to rot. 

He was slipping. He’d been warned about that, the way the river took everything, but what could he do but be devoured whole? The firewater found all the holes in his thinkpan and sparked across them, until only the Acheron remained. Slowly, slowly, slowly, he dissolved, wondering if maybe, just maybe, his dreams had steered him wrong.

Then he touched the bottom, and the river whispered in his ears, gentle and urgent as a red lover. He steeled himself and laid back to listen.

***

When Gamzee’s head broke water hours later, the moon was high in the sky. The stars were twinkling. The Burned Men still stood, watching and waiting, on the riverbank. He swam and then staggered his way toward them, and this time the river seemed to part to ease his way there. He saw the fire, smelled burning flesh, but the Acheron was blessedly lukewarm.

He fell to his knees in the shallows, paintless and naked, and turned his hands over and over, almost not believing that the pale, smooth skin there was his. The Burned Men were murmuring amongst themselves, now, and the ones standing closest to him were reaching to help him out of the river.

“Hold a minute, brothers,” he croaked, “a motherfucker’s got thirst.”

He cupped his hands in the river and lifted them to his lips, and the fire that ran down his throat was cool and sweet as spring water. 


	3. The Party: Matriarch I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hijinks, extras, deleted scenes, and previews for Homeward are posted over on [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) !

Typically, a Council of Matriarchs would be called sweeps in advance. 

It was no small thing, to leave their caverns in the care of their Matrons and travel to one location from all the far-flung corners of the homeworld. They had to sometimes, of course. Video calls and instant messages were well and good, but some things just had to be discussed in person. Cavern collapses, sudden plagues of undead, sudden hatchling booms. The Councils could be very somber affairs, as often as they were joyful. This one could have been either. 

Unfortunately, it was about the kidnapping of a Matriarch. 

It would usually be Prenay, the youngest and most popular of the Matriarchs, depending on one’s political leanings (the political leanings in question were subversive and highly illegal to harbor, but that was also why they were so popular), representing the Eastern Caverns, but Prenay was the topic at hand. Typically, that meant it would be her most trusted Matron, instead, but that had been Adhira, and Adhira was long-gone, herself. So, it had been Kanaya that was elected from among the more junior Matrons to attend the Council about her Matriarch, instead of her Matriarch. Kanaya had, she felt it bore saying, only been a Matron for half a sweep, and had no idea what she was doing. She’d mentioned this at the ~~drawing of lots~~ _election for the Council Representative_ , and was breezily informed by a senior that nobody really did, did she think she was special?

She glanced around the cavern they’d gathered in. It had housed a Mother Grub, long ago, the _first_ Mother Grub. In her passing, she’d left a meeting hall for her caretakers, lit by the soft blue glow of bioluminescent lichen and moss that creeped up the walls. She’d also left her very large, very hard-to-remove skeleton. Some things, you just had to work around. It did divide the room neatly, for when they all flocked to their individual cliques. 

The eldest among them had clustered together, whispering and casting furtive glances at the youngest, the group Kanaya herself was part of, clustered around Elodie of the Northeast. Feferi would like Elodie quite a lot, probably; they had a similar fire in their eyes, a similar stubborn set to their mouths. When Elodie leaned in closer to the group of them so her voice wouldn’t carry, she wrinkled her nose exactly like her friend would. 

“Look at them,” Elodie hissed, “what do they know about where Prenay is that we don’t? What are they hiding from us?” 

“You can’t just say things like that, Elodie!” another member of their group protested (She was very young, maybe even a little younger than Kanaya. Young enough that Kanaya honestly had no clue who she was or why she’d been selected as Matriarch. That must have been a very troubled cavern system.) “Why would they hide something like that from us?” 

“Why _wouldn’t_ they?” someone standing to Kanaya’s left countered. “Prenay wouldn’t be the first problem they handed over to the Empire.” 

Even Elodie paused a little at that, her eyebrows knitting together as she stared at the other jade. Kanaya wondered what was going through Elodie’s head, at that moment, and sort of wished she had Vriska on hand to ask. A frown could mean a lot of things; the way Elodie’s shoulders tensed and she leaned a little forward could mean just as many. Body language was dreadfully imprecise, and Kanaya wasn’t all that fluent in it to begin with. 

The accusation that had been leveled was a big one. But the accuser didn’t seem like she was taking it back, either. She met Elodie’s eyes and squared her shoulders and drew herself up and repeated herself, “Prenay wouldn’t be the first problem they handed over to the Empire.” 

“You’re accusing them of treason, Zahira,” Elodie’s voice was strained with the effort of keeping it low; Zahira made no such effort to muffle her short, sharp laugh. Kanaya shuffled ever so slightly away, now that she knew who this was. She had heard the name Zahira Ashiqq in her lessons, usually prefaced or followed by “avoid.” 

“You were accusing them of treason, too, you just used more words to do it.” 

Kanaya locked eyes with the jade that had spoken before Zahira, both of them wide-eyed and young and a little afraid of the tension between their elders (much, much later, they would learn that they should have been _very_ afraid, but the young are never half as fearful as they should be, or so the saying went). There had been a lot of it, lately, even before Prenay vanished, a lot of whispers about impropriety and excessive Imperial oversight. If Kanaya had disagreed with the other younger jades when they started calling for increased independence for their caste, she wouldn’t be among them right now. She’d also be pretty lonely, but that part didn’t bother her so much. She could deal with lonely. 

She wondered, as she watched Zahira and Elodie staring each other down, if she could deal with the alternative to loneliness, honestly. This had been easier when she was younger and had her friends to turn to; since she’d arrived in the caverns, she sometimes wished she could just turn back the time by a few sweeps. She wanted to be in the privacy of her room, watching messages zing past on the screen of her husktop. The twelve of them had come together and rallied around the agreement that they’d do what they needed to do to save Feferi, to make sure the Alternia she envisioned happened; when the time came to act on that commitment, the reality of laying the groundwork for the coup had turned out to be boring and terrifying and isolating, sometimes in turns and sometimes all at once. How long until it was her _friends_ that were staring each other down at a covert meeting? What would she do if it were Equius and Vriska, rather than Elodie and Zahira?

Zahira was the one to break the silence between them, “You’re being a _coward_. You accused them of being traitors, too, you’re just angry that I had enough of a spine to say it outright.” 

The entire argument was starting to seem sort of...private. Kanaya wasn’t necessarily fluent in body language, but she wasn’t blind, either; she saw the faint green flush on Elodie’s face, the smug sneer dancing at the corners of Zahira’s cruel mouth; everything _about_ Zahira was sort of cruel-looking. She was made of sharp angles and long lines, like one of those old statues of older warrior-goddesses that the jades had abandoned long ago. It was likely a very bad idea to do so, but Kanaya found herself inching between the two Matriarchs, hands outstretched. 

“We shouldn’t argue like this in mixed company,” she tried very hard to not sound too pleading (she did very badly), “we have to present a unified face in the Council.” 

They both stared at her for a long moment, like they had only just realized that there _were_ other trolls gathered there, and then Zahira stepped back. Kanaya wanted very badly to feel like she’d won something, but she didn’t think that there _was_ a way to win with Zahira. 

Elodie raked her fingers through her hair with a long, soft sigh, her eyes still fixed on Zahira, like Kanaya wasn’t standing _right there._ She was soft in all the same ways that Zahira was sharp; Kanaya wondered how she could stand to be towered over so much _._ Kanaya also wondered who had raised the two of them to be so _rude_.

“A unified face,” she agreed quietly, “at least for now.” 

Zahira left the group with another of those short, sharp laughs, tossing her hair over her shoulder, and Elodie watched her go with a peculiar, pinched sort of look on her face. 

“There will be time for debate, later,” she promised the group, “I shouldn’t have spoken so carelessly. Please, be at peace, for now. We have no way of knowing the truth.” 

Elodie took one last look at the faces gathered around her, and then she took off after Zahira, and the young Matriarch that had spoken before grabbed Kanaya’s elbow. 

“You’re shaking,” she fussed, “you should sit down a moment, before the Council proper begins.” 

She started to argue that she wasn’t shaking at all, but she bit her tongue in the process, so maybe she _was_ shaking just a little. 


	4. The Party: Blueblood I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been the week that felt like an entire month, youse guise. Ya bitch is T I R E D. Thus the later-than-usual update. For now, I think I'll be shooting for Saturdays for new chapters, but Homeward should keep updating weekly for the foreseeable future.
> 
> Hijinks, extras, deleted scenes, and previews for Homeward are posted over on [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) !

Equius had agreed to come speak to this “Perses,” whoever that may be, because _someone_ had to, and Vriska wasn’t a good option. 

It wasn’t that Vriska didn’t understand the intricacies of being a blueblood. She understood them perfectly well, for the most part, or, at least, she knew enough of them to weaponize them. Her weaponization of the very delicate intra-caste politics that were constantly happening far too much was, rather, the problem. Vriska was a Serket. Her blood was old, her teeth shone steel-grey, and she was all too happy to use her status, both as a proper Old-World Blue and as a Trialed adult, to ungracefully bludgeon her problems into submission. This was well and good in the largely-inhospitable mountain range where the Old-World clans made their home. The Spine-Equius had always wondered who had first decided to call the mountains the Spine. It wasn't really all that appropriate of a name; the Spine laid to the far north of the Empire. He would have given them a more fitting name, though he couldn't tell anyone what that would have been, for the life of him.-was a cruel place, and it paid well to be both mighty and judicious in the application of that might there.

When, of course, one was dealing with _other_ Old-Worlders. Perses was _not_ one of these. 

As best as Sianos had been able to tell them, Perses was about as New-World Blue as a troll could get without actively being involved in Imperial bureaucracy. She had no surname, from blood or from toil, to speak of, and she didn’t appear in the roll of any clan that Sianos could find. 

“ _The working theory,”_ Sianos had told him, “ _is that she’s probably a Firstborn. Which is charming, but irrelevant_ _.”_

Equius had asked him why he had mentioned this if it was irrelevant, and Sianos had replied that you never knew what might be relevant down the line. Sianos was, like most seadwellers, an incredibly silly, frivolous creature, and he delighted in irrelevancies. Equius thought this was very ungentlemanly of him. The _relevant_ information had been that Perses was an incredibly talented engineer, which Feferi (wisely) thought would be helpful if they were to go to war with the Empress that commanded _the_ Engineer. Feferi also (again, wisely) thought it would probably be a good idea to send a blueblood to speak with another blueblood. 

And that was how Equius found himself crammed into a very small chair, drinking tea from a very small cup, while Perses-who was a very beautiful and very charming shade of royal blue, with freckles on every bit of skin that her frilly, flared out skirt and white button-down shirt showed, which wasn't much to speak of, and who wore obscenely bright red faux pearl earrings-pittered around prettily and fussed to herself about having company. 

“Oh, dear, oh, dear, I’m so sorry, Mr. Equius, I don’t think I have any cups bigger than that one.” She was still digging through her cabinets, looking, though. 

“Really, this cup is perfectly fine, miss,” he said for the seventh time since he’d arrived. “I appreciate your hospitality, but I am, unfortunately, not here on a social call. I have something I must speak with you about.” 

“I know _that,_ Mr. Equius, but I still think I should find you a proper teacup.” 

She didn’t find the searched-for teacup, but she _did_ find a plate and a very large slice of pie, which she tutted at him about until he ate half of it. He suspected that it was probably an excellent pie; she’d used those lovely purplish-red cherries that Equius’s dam adored so much. Considering his imminent return to his ancestral hall, he was almost tempted to ask if he could wrap a slice up to bring home. It would probably get very badly crushed along the way, though. Which meant that _he_ had to eat it, to be polite. 

He wasn’t exactly fond of pie, but he also didn’t have to tell her that, he decided. 

“So, what was this business you wanted to talk about...?” Perses laughed nervously as she sat down. “I don’t really do politics, you know, Mr. Equius. You mentioned a coup, and I just don’t know if _I’m_ the girl you’d want for that.” 

He thought this over as he chewed pie to give himself some time to respond (it _was_ actually a lovely pie, very lush and sweet, the cherries just tart enough to complement all the sugar; his dam really would have loved it). It struck him, not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, that coups were very nasty business. That maybe some of that nastiness was rubbing off on _him_ , if he was willing to drag a female whose joys in life seemed to be baking, building robots, and very fluffy skirts down into the mud with him. Nobody was going to walk away from this with their hands clean. How fair was that to her? 

But he’d already asked those questions, in a strained whisper, to Feferi before he set out to do his tasks. 

“ _How fair is this to the Empire?” he’d asked, in her rented room in a very exclusive, very private,very expensive hotel in the White City, on a drizzly, dismal sunset only half a sweep ago. She’d put her tea down and pursed her lips, and his hands had shaken until he feared he’d wrench the delicate little handle off of her fine little teacup._

“ _How **f**_ ** _air_** _is it?” she’d asked in return, incredulous. “It’s not fair, at all! It’_ _s_ _n_ _o_ _t_ _f_ _ai_ _r_ _w_ _e_ _h_ _a_ _ve_ _t_ _o_ _d_ _o_ _i_ _t_ _th_ _i_ _s_ _w_ _ay_ _!_ _”_

Karkat had been the one to tell him, clipping his words and biting off syllables like he was beheading them, that the whole fucking situation was _obviously_ unfair, Zahhak you ridiculous fucking lummox, but you don’t fix shit by refusing to do something because you’re worried that _you’re_ being unfair. 

_“It’s a fucking **co**_ ** _up_** _, Equius, not a tea party. I need you to get your giant fucking head out of your even bigger asshole and get with the goddamned program, here.”_

It was all well and good for _t_ _hem_ to feel like that, he’d wanted to say. He’d been raised with old glory-tales about the lost days. The time before the Empire, when his people had been (or so the tales insisted) strong as mountains and prosperous as the sung-of, faraway Summerlands. In stories, wars and coups and affairs and betrayals all sound incredibly romantic. How was he meant to be prepared for the reality? He was still, in most of the ways that mattered, a wriggler. 

But Feferi was, too, really. All of his friends were. Karkat was crass, and boorish, and uncouth, but he was right. 

“If I may,” he said, finally, “we are not searching for a politician, Miss Perses. We are searching for an antidote to the Engineer.” 

She balked visibly at that, and he couldn’t blame her. Hadn’t he, when Feferi suggested it? Counteracting the _Engineer_ ? Surely, it couldn’t be done, he’d argued, surely, they would be able to find some way to work around her. But who could hope to counteract the most brilliant inventor in Alternian history? What would it mean if they _did_? Weren’t some things sacred, he’d said? 

“ _S_ _ure,”_ _Feferi_ _had said, “things that are_ ** _actually sacred_** _are. But legacies aren’t. Legacies are just things that stand until someone outdoes you.”_

_“_ The Empire needs to change, Miss Perses,” he continued, his voice wavering and young and desperate-sounding, even to himself. “It can be better. It ought to be better. But things rarely improve unprovoked. We know what future we want for our Empire, our people, and now we must fight for it. We can pay you. We _will_ pay you. Please, at least consider my offer.” 

She promised to think about it, at least, and Equius, having thoroughly ruined what really had been a lovely tea, bid her a farewell and beat his exit. An hour passed, and then two, and three, and then a whole week, and he heard nothing from her, and resigned himself to returning mostly empty-handed to his friends when Feferi called her banners. He had done all he could, he would argue, but who went to war for someone they only knew _o_ _f_? 

And then his palmhusk dinged to alert him of a message from an unknown sender, when he was just reaching the foothills of the Spine. He stopped at the head of the trail that would take him to the ancestral hall of his clan to read it. 

‘ _So, Mr. E,’_ it read, ‘ _I_ _’ve been thinking about what you said. About needing to fight for the future...’_

And Equius smiled for the first time in what felt like sweeps. 


	5. The Party: Heiress II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I'm technically a little late on the update this week. I was sick, and also I overestimated how long it would take me to write this bitch. The Fef chapter is going up now, but keep your eyes peeled in the next few days, because there might be some bonus material linked if I can get it all written by Wednesday.
> 
> Hijinks, extras, deleted scenes, and previews for Homeward are posted over on [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) !

Knowing _how_ to play politics didn’t make Feferi _like_ playing politics. 

The weeks since she had come to the Palace had been a blur of cleaning and planning and holding court for the seemingly infinite number of aristocrats who had found their way all the way to her doorstep. They’d barely had time to get staff in to dust everything and polish up the throne before the first of a long line of seadwellers had been announced, come all the way from the Depths to court favor with the Heiress who may be an Empress. For politeness’s sake, of course. Nobody expected Feferi to actually best her Ancestor in single combat, least of all Feferi herself. 

When she was still very young, very much _younger_ at least, Feferi had watched a predecessor of hers challenge the Condescension. That Heiress had been the same age Feferi was now, popular and pretty and bold as brass. Feferi still remembered the slow drip of blood from the Empress’s trident, the wicked grin the Condesce had thrown over her shoulder at the younger of her Heiresses. It would be her turn one day, that grin had promised. One day very soon. 

Well, Feferi was perhaps not as bold or as pretty as that other Heiress, but she wasn’t an idiot, either. _Or_ as willing to risk a broken nail, fighting her Ancestor. Her nails were _expensive_. 

Watching half of the Nautical Aristocracy cringe as she tapped those expensive nails on the armrest of the throne was worth every cent, though. 

“Can I clear the room, yet?” Eridan asked her under his breath from her right. “We’ve been here since sunset.” 

“And we will stay here until sunrise, if we have to. The Aristocracy has concerns.” She looked each of the gathered violetbloods, nine in total, in the eye individually. “The least we can do is hear them.” 

“Concerns is a rather mild way to put it.” The eldest of them was the speaker. Carack Galiot. Dignified, with greying hair and a well-lined face, built like a brick wall. She inclined her head out of respect, as much as to indicate that he should continue. 

“The situation in the Summerlands is out of hand. There’s too much bickering, too much infighting. Someone must resolve it.” 

She glanced at Eridan, for a moment, but he was facing forward, so all she managed to get a good look at was the sharp line of his tensed jaw. Karkat, on her other side, rolled his eyes when she looked his way. Ever the politician, that Karkat. It was times like these that she missed Terezi. 

She sighed and leaned her cheek against her fist. 

“The throne has never involved itself in the affairs of disputed territory, before. Why should it start with me?” 

This wasn’t, of course, entirely true. There had been Imperial involvement in the Summerlands, before; Feferi knew the history, and Carack had lived it. Said Imperial involvement had been a _disaster_. An embarrassment of such scale that it was written out of history, so the Peixes line wouldn’t have to blush every time the equatorial belt came up. 

“You’ll be a new Empress, will you not? Aren’t things meant to change when we transition into a new Empire?” 

Had he been anyone other than Carack Galiot, hero of more wars than Feferi could name off-hand, companion since wrigglerhood of that great Admiral and former Imperial Consort, Lao Wei Sun Tzu, Feferi would have been obligated to twist his head off like a bottlecap. Because he _was_ Carack Galiot, all she could do was make some sound stuck between a laugh and a snarl and lean forward in her Throne. 

_Her_ throne. It sounded nice. 

“We’re not a new Empire, yet. But, when we are, I will remember the Summerlands,” she promised. 

“And that’s all I can ask, my Heiress.” 

He didn’t bow on his way out with his retinue, but she hadn’t expected him to. He’d acknowledged her; that was victory enough. 

“Fucking fins,” Karkat grumbled, once they were alone, “one thing after a-fucking-nother with them. How the fuck did you live in the Citadel all this time? I’d’ve wanted to burn the whole goddamned place down.” 

“It’s hard to burn things down at the bottom of the ocean, Kar.” 

“It’s a fucking figure of speech, Eridan.” 

Feferi just sat back and tuned in and out of their bickering, thinking. Her debut was coming. She could feel it bearing down on them like the pall of death. Only a few perigees until a warship arrived to take her to the Fleet, to face the Condescension. It was well and good and her birthright to hold court in the White City, for now, and all of the members of the Aristocracy, Nautical and otherwise, who haunted the Palace halls amid its ghosts would have gathered there eventually, anyway, for her send-off. She wasn’t the first Heiress to sit on the Imperial Throne for the blink of an eye before her inevitable death. 

It was a cruel system, but she’d known that all her life. 

“Sianos was supposed to report, by now,” she thought aloud, “where is he?” 

Late, was the answer, for dramatic effect. He came sweeping into the throne room with a holopad in hand, several thick, ancient books under his arm. In the brief time she’d known him, she’d never seen him so disheveled, dust from the lower libraries thick in his hair, ink smudged on his cheek. He frowned at the empty room, and then at her. 

“You know, Feferi,” he said lightly, “I think you’ve asked me to figure out something impossible.” 

“I warned you from the beginning that this wouldn’t be _easy._ ” 

“And until I started looking into it, I didn’t realize “this is going to be a toughie, Sianos” was your way of saying “it’s going to be nigh-on impossible, because some things don’t die in any meaningful way.”” 

“ _Everything_ dies.” Eridan touched his gun when he said that. She didn’t even need to look to know. “Somehow or other.” 

“Not the Singer, not easily, and, perhaps, not permanently.” 

Sianos sat on the stairs that lead to the Throne and began laying his books out at Feferi’s feet. It must have taken a long time to dig all of them out; some were probably Empress Faedra’s. Maybe one of them was the very book that had taught her how to call the Singer in the Depths to Alternia to begin with, all those millennia ago. They were mildewed and rotted in places, now; the puffs of dust that they released when Sianos opened them smelled like the worst kind of library. Did black magic really just smell like musty old books? 

She leaned forward to get a better look at the diagrams and writing, and then her palmhusk began ringing. Loudly. She must have forgotten to silence it. Oh, it would have been _hilarious_ to see all those aristrocrats’ faces if her palmhusk had gone off while they were petitioning. She almost actually answered it, but she also didn’t really feel like it. Ultimately, she just let it ring until it went silent. 

Annnnnnd then it started ringing again less than two seconds later. 

This time, she _did_ dig it out with an aggravated sigh, and took a quick look at the caller ID. And then a second look. And then a third. And then she groaned. 

**L A O C A L L I N G**


	6. The Party: Heretic II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Homeward is back biches.  
> Hijinks, extras, deleted scenes, and previews for Homeward are posted over on [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) !

The Acheron was still burning in the back of his throat when he went a-preaching. 

He wondered if that fire on the tip of his tongue would ever go out. Did he even want it to? Not really. The burning sensation made it easier to imagine that he was breathing fire at the crowds that gathered around him, when he returned to the West. Dragon fire, prophetic fire, flames straight from the heart of the Southern Carnival washing over small crowds in damp, smelly alleyways and seedy courtyards. It was as righteous as any sermon his Ancestor had ever given in the Court of Miracles, to Gamzee’s mind. Were they not his flock? Was he not their shepherd? He’d left an initiate and returned a Messiah, and Messiahs took what they gathered gladly. 

He looked around at the white faces crowding around him from where he stood on his beggar’s pulpit and straightened his spine, just a touch, before he spoke. 

“We have strayed, brothers!” The box he was standing on smelled like the fish that had been in it until earlier in the evening, but he was tall. It would do. Got him just high enough to see the everyone’s face. “We have strayed, and we have fallen, and we have been led into barren pastures! The West grazes at dirt, blind to the grass a few feet away!” 

He couldn’t usually tell exactly _when_ he lost an audience. It always happened, though lately it had been happening later and later in his preaching, but, if there was some sort of magic switch the right words flipped, Gamzee couldn’t tell what those words might be. One moment, the crowd would be listening (like they _should_ ), the next they’d be walking away. Like some sort of string had been cut, they would all go lurching off, and he would keep speaking for another hour or two to a shrinking congregation until the last stragglers went on their way. 

But today, he lost the crowd nearly instantly, and he knew exactly why. 

They all, one by one, turned away from him and toward a figure at the back of the gathering, leaned against a wall. Tall and lithe and beautiful like a well-made spear, with face paint that called back to the floral patterns so popular in the Eastern Court. She raised a single hand to greet the onlookers, and they scattered not long after, all with their eyes averted away from her. Gamzee knew this female well. He didn’t need her to push off the wall and step into the moonlight. He didn’t need to see her face clearly. It was nearly as familiar to him as his own. 

This female was his dam. Alitha Lualdi, Sentinel of the West. 

She took her time approaching him, which was nice, because it gave him a few minutes to stow away the empty fish-crate and straighten his shirt out. He never managed to get all the wrinkles out of his shirts or match socks properly, but he could at least _try_ to look respectable, he reckoned. Alitha still gave his shirt a few tugs when she reached him, and, like magic, his shirt was lying flat. Fucking miracles. 

“Your shirt is stained,” she said flatly and poked a spot in the middle of his chest. 

“The world is stained, sister.” 

“I’m no sister to you, Gamzee, don’t preach to me. You need to change your shirt.” 

“Didja come all the way here from Court to fuss at me, Sentinel?” 

The look Alitha gave him was nearly as scalding as that first step into the Acheron. Wasn’t the first time he’d gotten that look from her. Probably wouldn’t be the last. He just grinned at her, and she stepped away and crossed her arms. She wasn’t wearing her armor, today. She didn’t have her spear in hand. She looked so much smaller without them. Not a Sentinel, just a female. 

“I came all the way here from Court because the whispers down the lane said someone was preaching blasphemy in the White City. I want to be surprised that it turned out to be you, but I’m not.” 

“It ain’t blasphemy, sister, it’s _truth_.” 

“The next time I have to tell you to stop calling me sister, you’ll have to find a way to speak without a _tongue_ , wriggler.” 

“I have the Acheron for a tongue, what need could I have for flesh?” 

“The Acheron will have a hard time preaching through you without it.” 

There was a mottled lilac bruise on her cheek under her paint. She’d incorporated it into her design, and it probably would have fooled anyone else, but it was lit up like a neon sign for Gamzee. Here was the dam that birthed him and nurtured him, and there was a mark on her face from some _fucker’s_ fist. He stepped closer to her and lowered his voice and pointed at it. 

“What motherfucker did that?” 

“Do you expect me to remember _everyone_ I do battle with?” 

“That weren’t no battle, and I’d know it fine without the Acheron.” He looked from the bruise to her eyes to the bruise again and growled low in his throat. “The old man did it, didn’t he?” 

“And if he did?” 

“If he did, I’ll kill him sooner.” 

“You shouldn’t blaspheme like that in public.” 

What kind of fucking world was it where _Gamzee_ was the blasphemer and the Highblood that ravaged his Sentinel wasn’t? What kind of motherfucking world? He wanted to scream. He wanted to grab Alitha by the shoulders and make her answer that. He wanted, he wanted, he wanted. 

He bowed his head and followed his dam down the street as the drizzle turned into a thunderstorm. She bought a new shirt and mug of tea, and then she was on her way, back to the Court of Miracles with a warning that he ought to keep his head down more. 

Gamzee finished his tea, changed his shirt, raised his head, and went back to blaspheming loudly. 


	7. The Party: Matriarch II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can always be found at [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) or my main at [SocialMediaSocrates](socialmediasocrates.tumblr.com) if you'd like to drop a line in my inbox! Anon is always open!

When Kanaya had imagined a Council of the Matriarchs, she’d envisioned something very dignified. The stately, cloth-draped, typically veiled shepherdesses of the jade caste, faces bare to one another, discussing the affairs of the caverns over tea with lowered voices and soft, occasional laughs. There may have been arguing in the meeting hall, but surely the Grand Cavern would be more...amicable. 

This was, as it turned out, wrong in at least seven ways, six of which had everything to do with Zahira Ashiqq, High Matriarch of the North. 

“Why should we keep giving fodder to the Imperial war machine?” she asked, lounging in her seat. “What benefit has there been to the jade caste in our compliance?” 

“The benefit of not having our caverns invaded and our entire way of life uprooted!” That was Amolii, whose caverns bordered the Badlands. “Do you think the Empire will hesitate to do to us what they did to the limes?” 

“Where has your pride gone, Mother? We were warriors, once, and now we shrink and quiver. Are the young mothers also so weak about the knees?” Zahira’s eyes were on Kanaya, now, sharp as the spear at her side. “Tell me, Maryam of the East, do you fear battle?” 

Kanaya sat up just a little straighter in her seat and glanced to her left and right, as much to break eye-contact with Zahira as anything. What had she expected from the bare faces of the Matriarchs? Perhaps not the heavy lines around Amolii’s eyes and mouth. Perhaps not Elodie’s youthful softness. Perhaps not all of those gem-clear eyes fixed on _her_ , waiting for her answer. She cleared her throat and looked back to Zahira. 

“Why would I fear battle from the East?” Had she mimicked that disdainful drawl well enough? The relaxed posture, like a lioness at rest? She must have; mirth danced in Zahira’s eyes, and she threw her head back when she laughed. 

“Yet you came to the Council armed, just as I did. Do you know how to use your weapon, little one, or did you bring it for show?” 

“I know how to use it well enough, Mother, you needn’t worry for your lamb.” 

“Ah, but I must; it seems the other shepherdesses have begun wearing your clothes.” 

Amolii flushed deep green at that and lunged forward in her seat in a flurry of cloth, fingers digging into the armrests so hard that Kanaya swore she heard one of them crack as she bared her teeth. What came next was nearly too fast for Kanaya to follow. Zahira, eyes alight, wicked grin on her lips, was on her feet, arms outstretched. The Matriarch to Amolii’s right held her back in her seat. Elodie was standing, too, now, between the two, hands held out in supplication. 

“Oh, so you remember how to bite back _now,_ against a sister, but not against the Empire in defense of your charges!” Zahira’s taunt was followed by a single sharp, cruel laugh. “I was wrong, Amolii, I’ll concede it; your pride is so outshone by your cowardice that I struggled to see it.” 

“Your pride will destroy us all, if we allow it! Did you do away with Prenay to make your treason easier, Zahira? _Did you_?” 

Kanaya’s eyes were young and not prepared for following the movements of the Warrior herself; she heard Zahira’s snarl, and Amolii’s scream, and the harsh crack of snapping bone, and the wet tearing of flesh, and then smelled iron. And then her vision caught up with the rest of her senses, and she almost vomited. Matriarch Amolii’s head had rolled across the floor of the Council until it came to rest at Kanaya’s feet, eyes wide and glassy and unseeing, mouth still hanging open. Unable to meet those eyes, Kanaya looked up and away, to where Zahira stood in the middle of the room, hands dripping jade, fangs bared at her colleagues as they cowered away from her. 

“Who else believes as she did?” Zahira demanded. “Who else will step forward and admit to it?” 

Elodie had been knocked aside when Zahira lunged for Amolii, and she stood slowly, now, hands scraped and bleeding from catching her fall. Kanaya started to stand to help the young High Matriarch, but a hand on her elbow stopped her, and she turned to find that Elwood, Prenay’s handmaid who had joined Kanaya in her journey as was only proper, had caught her. Elwood shook her head, once, and tugged at Kanaya’s elbow to pull her back into her seat when she hesitated to sit. 

“Zahira,” Elodie’s voice was almost too soft to hear, “please.” 

There was a long, silent, tense moment between the two of them, Zahira staring down at Elodie, Elodie’s hands still held out. What could she possibly be pleading for, Kanaya wondered. Hadn’t blood already been spilled? Wasn’t Amolii already dead, her head resting at Kanaya’s feet, seeping blood and other fluids that didn’t bear thinking about into her shoes? There was nothing left to beg for, but there was Elodie, and that was what she was doing. 

“Hear me!” Zahira spun away from Elodie and back toward the gathered Matriarchs with a low snarl. “Each of you cowards will face judgment for sacrificing our young on the altar of appeasement! Peace will not last forever, mothers, and your hands are too soft for the nasty work ahead! But mine are _not._ My caverns will not surrender one more wriggler to the wilds, and, if the Empire comes, I will do what you will not. Their blood will flow, and I will wash my hair in it!” 

Kanaya turned to Elwood, eyes wide, half-expecting her companion to be as horrified as the rest of the Council. But Elwood just folded her hands in front of her mouth and watched Zahira exiting the council room quietly. 

“Well, Kanaya,” she said finally, “this was rather unproductive, wasn’t it?” 


	8. The Party: Blueblood II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can always be found at [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) or my main at [SocialMediaSocrates](socialmediasocrates.tumblr.com) if you'd like to drop a line in my inbox! Anon is always open!

Trains didn’t go into the Spine. 

This was the product of several, intersecting issues. First: the Spine was technically contested territory between the Empire and the Northern Carnival, and the Grand Highblood of the North didn’t want Imperial rail-lines in it. Second: it was infamously difficult to build anything across those mountains, with all their jagged edges and sudden drop-offs, and, while undoubtedly the Engineer _could_ figure something out, she had many, many more things to be worried about, and the position of Imperial Architect had been vacant since the Third Empire. Third, and most importantly: the Spine was home to the old clans of the bluebloods, and they would likely have just ripped up the lines and melted them down, anyway. 

Knowing this all to be true did not make Equius _enjoy_ the hike from where the railways ended to his ancestral hall. 

The very end of the rails was a small village in the foothills of the Spine named Breakwater, bordered on one side by the freezing North Sea and on the other by the mountains and home, primarily, to fishermen and salt harvesters and the small handful of tradesmen that supported both industries. He tried to remember what he’d learned about Breakwater, the only civilization close to the Ridge, as a young wriggler, but not very much came to mind. It wasn’t a very remarkable little place. 

He trudged past the sturdy, sea-bleached rock buildings of the village, eyes scanning the mountains above him to see if he could catch a glimpse of the Ridge from here. It had been so long since he’d traveled these footpaths that he almost feared he would get lost in the mountains, but then he saw it. Looming above him, brass and stone and resplendent indigo banners. Watcher’s Ridge, traditional home to everyone the Zahhak Clan claimed. It was a sprawling place, built sturdily into a mountain, more than half of it hidden from sight in the mountain or beneath it. He wondered if his workshop had collected a lot of dust since he’d set out from his home to help save his friend. 

He ended up having to pause for a breather about halfway up the mountain, both because it was a very, very long hike, and because his phone was buzzing so much in his pocket that he was half concerned that it would wriggle its way out and go clattering back down the path. That just wouldn’t be worth chasing after, Equius decided. He’d have to replace it. _Again_. Sollux would be beside himself. 

_Txt from: N_

_:33 < equius!! _

_:33 < are you home yet? _

_Txt to: N_

_D -- > Please remember to not use our real names, N _

_D -- > Recall: this makes S very upset _

_D -- > And no, I have not reached the Ridge, yet _

_D -- > Time will tell if this is a relief _

Sollux did not, in truth, even like it when they used typing quirks; he had sent them a very long, profanity-laden message in the group chat about how this made them easily identified by Imperial web crawlers, should they manage to intercept text messages despite Sollux’s numerous wards and safeguards against this. But there were some things that were...perhaps not sacred, but important in a deeply personal way that bordered on it. Perhaps Equius was sentimental. He would have so little time with Nepeta; he preferred to enjoy the small things they shared. Sollux could live with him making some room for personhood with his moirail. 

_Txt from: N_

_:33 < you've b33n homesick fur the ridge fur sw33ps! _

_:33 < why so nervous about it meow??? _

_Txt to: N_

_D -- > I _

_D -- > Honestly I don't really know _

_D -- > I just have this _

_D -- > Very uncomfortable feeling about it all _

_Txt from: N_

_:33 < you've got this e _

_:33 < and if they don't listen to you just crush their skulls! _

_:33 < you're good at that! _

_Txt to: N_

_D -- > I appreciate the vote of confidence _

_D -- > As dubious as I find it _

He had a text waiting for him from Perses, too, and that knowledge made his heart flip over a little, half expecting her to be pulling out of the coup before it even happened, but it was just some well-meant platitudes. She hoped his journey was going well, he should stop by for pie again the next time he’s in town, and etcetera, etcetera. He wanted to tell her that his journey was not going very well at all, because he absolutely hated hiking, but he responded that everything was going as well as it could, and that he would very much like to have tea with her again, and he tucked that tea date away in the back of his head in the little file he kept titled ‘ _Reasons to Maintain One’s Composure When it is Very Badly Tested.’_

There was a text message waiting for him from Feferi, too, and another from Karkat, but he decided that he would check those once he actually got to the Ridge, stood with a long, heavy sigh, and set off back up the mountain. His legs, and lungs, protested the pace that he set as he ascended, but he made it to the gates of the Ridge before the moon set. 

Waiting for him at the gates was a tall female, spine ramrod straight, powerful shoulders and arms hidden by the heavy furs she wore, long, thick dark hair uncharacteristically loose. She stared at him as he approached, frowning, arms crossed, but her stern face melted into a smile the closer he came. 

“Equius,” Lirrhi Zahhak said quietly, stepping out of the shadow of the gate, arms outstretched toward him. “I was beginning to think you would never come home, boy.” 

Eyes stinging, Equius dropped his bag and collapsed into his dam’s arms. 


	9. The Party: Heiress III

Feferi hated going down into Sollux’s little...den. 

The closer and closer her debut came, the more and more time she found herself spending in the windowless little room where Sollux had set up all of his monitors and computers, and the more she absolutely hated it. If the other nerve center of the coup that he’d set up for after it actually kicked off was anything like this one, she was going to end up losing her mind before she ever became an Empress. He had somehow managed to take a vast basement and fill it with so many wires and monitors that Feferi could barely walk two feet without nearly tripping. Sollux sat in the middle of an ocean of black cables, his computer chair a lonely little island, tippity-tap-tapping away on his keyboard, occasionally swearing to himself quietly and adjusting into a different, equally uncomfortable-looking position. 

“Yes,” he said as she approached him, “everything’s as ready as it’s getting. No, nobody’s cover is fucked, yet. Yes, Equius and Nepeta are gonna be the first ones to blow it.” 

“When did you learn how to read minds?” She perched on the edge of his desk and looked at the monitors across from her. 

“Don’t need mind-reading powers when you’ve been asking me the same questions every night for a fucking perigee, FF.” 

“Vriska is late.” 

“Last time she texted me, she said she was a few nights out. She’ll be here in time.” He snorted. “Probably.” 

“Sianos hasn’t come out of the archives in weeks.” 

“You asked him to find a way to kill your lusus; that shit takes a while.” 

“Equius hasn’t--” 

“ _Feferi_.” He pushed away from the desk and swiveled the chair around so he was facing her. “This is gonna sound fucking ridiculous coming from me, but when was the last time you took a walk? Or spent time with Eridan? Or did anything that _wasn’t_ obsessing over this shit?” 

She stared at the monitor instead of answering, watching Karkat pacing in his hotel room, yanking hard at his hair while he spoke furiously into a palmhusk. Trying to read his lips was useless, as usual. He spoke too quickly to keep up with him, except for when he paused to emphasize his favorite word: fuck. As she watched, she counted four different emphases. That was borderline polite for him. Maybe he would do alright at the party, after all. 

“Who is he on the phone with?” she asked, and pointedly ignored Sollux’s long, harsh sigh. Also, the way he proceeded to hammer on his keyboard as he typed, like he was imagining it was her face. He probably was. Knowing him. 

Sollux stopped typing for a moment to squint at his screen. 

“Looks like it’s Adelin,” he finally replied. “It’s been easier to get her on the ‘husk, lately.” 

“Is something wrong with Tavros?” 

“Yeah, the same thing that’s wrong with all of us. He’s _busy_.” 

She took the hint, this time. With a last glance over her shoulder at the monitor, where Karkat’s conversation with Adelin was continuing, Feferi made her escape from the basement. Maybe Sollux had a point. Maybe she ought to speak to Eridan. If only she could find him. 

*** 

Finding Eridan was, thankfully, never very hard. 

There were really two or three places that he might be at any given time. First: the shooting range, reminding other members of the Nautical Aristocracy that, while it might not be Ahab’s Crosshairs, his gun did fine. Second: the archives, hovering over Sianos’s shoulder while the two of them tried not to damage the books. Thirdly: the kitchens. 

She found him awkwardly perched on a counter, crammed into a dark little corner. He paused stuffing an entire roll into his mouth for a moment, made eye contact with her, and then shoved the rest of it in. Clever trick. Making sure she would have to wait for him to finish chewing for him to say anything. It had been cleverer when they were _four_ and that actually worked on her. 

“The purples are going to start arriving soon,” she sighed. 

Eridan made a show of chewing his stolen roll. He scooted further into the corner and awkwardly jammed his knees into his chin in a way that let her know that he was curled up around an entire bag of food. That had worked better on her when they were four, too; she hauled herself up on to the counter and reached over his knees to steal a tiny sandwich. His noise of protest was muffled by his partly-chewed food. Win for Feferi? Win for Feferi. 

“This could all still go completely wrong.” 

“It could,” he agreed, swallowing his food so hard that _her_ throat felt scraped, “and you know what we’ll do if it _does_ , Fef?” 

“What?” 

Eridan leaned forward with a wide grin, all sharp teeth and bright eyes. Were they a little more violet than they’d been a perigee or two ago? If she was being honest with herself, Feferi probably just hadn’t looked him in the eye for more than half a second in a while. Party-planning had kind of absorbed her entire life. Sometimes, she even forgot that she was planning on ruining the whole thing. 

Had Sianos brought a gun with him, or was he going to buy one? She was going to have to ask him. He needed to be armed _before_ the party. There wasn’t going to be any time to-- 

Eridan cut off her thoughts by grabbing her chin. 

“If everything goes completely to shit,” he said decisively, “we’re just gonna fucking shoot our way out.” 

*** 

When the first of the purplebloods arrived, Feferi seriously considered the possibility that they’d have to shoot their way out, after all. 

She had sent the invitation to her debut to the North as a matter of courtesy, not really expecting a response in any capacity. The Grand Condemning, Highblood of the North, hadn’t bothered to come to any other Heiress’s debut. Why would hers be special? She’d honestly considered not even bothering with the invitation, but that would have been rude, and rudeness had caused wars, before. With her luck, it would have caused one, this time, too. It occurred to her, now, that the Empire and the North going to war again might have actually helped her coup, but too late, now. She’d made the polite overture, and...well. He’d answered. 

Adonis Brando was a mountain of a male. Statuesque, dripping in gold, draped in some filmy, flimsy thing that kind of looked like a shirt, he towered over her, even as she sat in her throne. The smile he offered was sly and condescending, and the hand he took one of hers in was large enough to feel like a threat. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Eridan’s hand drifting toward his gun. 

“I must confess, Heiress,” Adonis’s voice had a thrum to it, a low undertone to an already deep voice that settled in her chest uncomfortably, “I hadn’t expected an invitation to your debut. Not that it’s unappreciated. It’s been so long since I last attended a party in the Court of Miracles.” 

“If the Many-Faced God is kind and puts me on the throne permanently, I hope Imperial relations with the North will be more pleasant. This seemed like a good start.” 

“If the Many-Faced God is kind...” She felt the laugh that he muffled by kissing her hand, even if she didn’t hear it. “Well, we’ll see, won’t we?” 

“I hope to entertain.” 

“Oh, little Heiress, you’re already entertaining.” 

Adonis bowed to her and winked to Eridan before he left the throne room to allow the next purple to approach her, and her hand twitched toward her trident for just a moment before she stopped herself. Before they had set up to receive their guests, Eridan had offered her a gun. Just a small one. A little thing with mother of pearl inlays in its grip. More decorative than lethal. It was tucked under one of the folds of her skirt, now, between her thigh and the arm of her throne. 

It might have been mostly decorative, but she had killed with decorations, before. As the Grand Highblood of the East entered the throne room, she wondered if she would have to, again, soon. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can always be found at [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) or my main at [SocialMediaSocrates](socialmediasocrates.tumblr.com) if you'd like to drop a line in my inbox! Anon is always open!


	10. ASIDE I: shore leave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While the purplebloods arrive for Feferi's debut, shore leave happens elsewhere.

Plainly, he didn’t get enough opportunities like this. 

He owed a lot of people a lot of favors that he probably wasn’t ever going to do, or would at least grumble about enough to make them _think_ that he wasn’t going to do them, but, oh by all the faces of God, it was worth it. He’d gotten some shore leave arranged for himself, _and_ for Rhienn, _and_ at the same time. Was it technically intended for them to go back planetside to handle whatever affairs they’d left behind to join the Fleet? Yes. Did he have any intention whatsoever of handling bills when he _could_ be handling his favorite redblood? Absolutely not. 

( _When he was particularly frustrated during all the paperwork and queues as he tried to get to his shore leave, he envisioned his mate, flushed and open beneath him, her ruby red eyes on his face, kissing the thumb he’d pressed against her lips, her inner thighs stained a violet that tended toward red. There were little marks all over her neck and chest and breasts from his love-bites, his mouth was red and hers was violent, and he was considering commissioning a little something of her in the throes of passion for the millionth time, though he never would. The way she clutched at anything on hand and her mouth formed a perfect little o with every harsh thrust into her was borderline sacred._ ) 

It had been over a decade since the last time his shore leave and her shore leave lined up; when they met up in his room in a swanky hotel in the White City, he nearly forgot to lock the door behind him in his desperation to touch her, again. He’d forgotten how small she was next to him. How her hair smelled (like her workshop, like metal, like sea winds and his cologne, faintly, under it all), the taste of her kisses (those cinnamon candies she liked so much, blood from chewing the inside of her mouth raw, cherry lipgloss, though not very much of it, she tended to lick it off; that had been _his_ job, once), her _warmth_. Oh, how had he forgotten that...? She’d been his own little slice of summer, soft, sweet heat wrapped in infinitely fragile skin and curls that remembered the shape of his fingers, even now. 

She shivered when his hand crept up her shirt, and then again as he slowly, slowly ran his finger up her spine. 

“I hate Fleet uniforms,” he grumbled. 

“Don’t,” she started, a moment too late. It wasn’t like the shirt was exactly _quality_ ; it shredded like nothing, and he was of the opinion that she looked better bare-chested anyway. Her pants, admittedly, he could have been a little gentler with. And her panties. And her bra. She hissed at him for that, and then that hiss turned into a little gasp as the hand not otherwise occupied with her hair slid between her thighs. Hadn’t that always been her way? She’d snarl and curse at him, and then his finger would press into her, and his Rhienn, all piss and vinegar most of the time, would turn into a mewling little mess. Some things didn’t change. She shivered and complained that he was cold, but she still rolled her hips desperately into his hand, trying and mostly failing to get any sort of friction on her sheath. 

“You know what I’ve been thinking about, lately?” he whispered against her skin, pressing a final kiss to the reddish-purplish hickey he’d left on her neck. “Our first time. Remember that, lass?” 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, don’t...” She trailed off with a strangled little noise when he ghosted his thumb over her sheath, finally. There was that red flush to her skin he remembered so fondly. She’d been younger and paler, with hands less calloused and a few less scars, that first time, all those sweeps ago. She got riled up just as easily as she ever had, though. Centuries of experience behind her, now, and her face was as red as it had been, then. 

“ _I_ remember.” He was angling her toward the bed, inching closer and closer, his bulge already straining against his sheath. But he was being good. Even with her making those cute little faces, and even with the mating hormones in the air, and even with the bright red slick between her thighs growing every time he moved his finger. If they kept stumbling so slowly, though, he made no promises of his own good behavior. “You were all virginal and red-faced, and I perched you in my lap...” She whined when he pulled his finger out of her, and he grinned and kissed her dense, dark curls. “Remember how you could scarcely walk the next day?” 

“ _T_ _hat part_ , I wish I could forget.” 

“Oh, I’m going to be giving you a refresher course,” he promised with a lascivious grin. “Keeps a man awake during the day, you know. Thinking of all the ways he’d like to have you.” 

She would have hissed at him if he’d called the little squeak she made when he pulled her down on to the bed with him cute, so he didn’t. He might have, usually, but they were kissing, now, and that was so much more important. 

“Are you going to fuck me, or what?” she complained between kisses. “All talk, all of a sudden?” 

Ah, that was his girl. Ever fire and brimstone, even as he lined himself up with her entrance, even as her body welcomed him into it. She’d told him once that he felt like being fucked with an icicle, and he’d told her that she felt like she was trying to melt his cock off, but neither of them had ever complained in the moment, and he doubted either of them ever would. She was hot, yes, almost unbearably, at first, but he liked watching the way she tossed her head back and strained against the hands pinning her down and rolled her hips into him when he refused to touch her bulge. Rhienn was, in his humble opinion, always beautiful, but never more so than when he was inside her. 

“What was that about me being all talk?” he cooed. “Is this better, my lovely? Is this what you wanted?” 

“Oh, _fuck_ you.” 

He grinned at the little hitch in her voice, and then pressed that grin to the tender skin in the crook of her neck. She had plenty of hickeys there, already, but that wasn’t going to stop him from leaving more of them. He liked to see her marked. He liked when she smelled of him. Reminded other males that _he_ was the one that Rhienn writhed under and pleaded for, _he_ was the one that coaxed that little half-sob of relief from her when he finally let her bulge (what little she had) curl around his finger. 

He stayed there for a little while, listening to her breathing, the little hitch when he pulled back, the stuttering “ah-ah-ah" every time he thrust into her. She rolled her hips into his hand when he tugged, ever so gently, on her bulge, and the noise she made when the motion pulled him deeper into her almost sounded like his name. 

When he scraped his teeth against her pulse, he felt it fluttering under them. 

Across the room, in the pile of shredded cloth that had once been a Fleet uniform, a palmhusk rung and rung and rung, unnoticed. 


	11. The Party: Heretic III

Gamzee would have liked to see the look on his old man’s face when he was forced to share a train car with his heretical offspring, but the cowardly motherfucker’d decided to make his own way to the White Palace. Oh, he’d pleaded some business he needed to deal with on the way, but he wasn’t fooling anyone, and least of all Gamzee. The coward just didn’t want to look him in the eye. He knew what was coming. But he would never admit to that, so off the Grand Highblood of the West and his Sentinel had gone, leaving Gamzee to straggle down to the station and catch the train all on his lonesome. 

He’d looked forward to getting a chance to spend the journey to the heart of the White City with Alitha, but you develop a talent for swallowing disappointment early in life as a purpleblood. 

He managed to cram himself into a back corner of the purple car, his back to the wall, facing the rest of the occupants. He knew some of them alright, others were new faces entirely. All of the brothers and sisters that Gamzee knew as well as his own skin were too low in the ranks of the Carnival to be there, right then, but at least he had acquaintances. 

Well. There was _one_ troll that was more than an acquaintance here. 

Kotone Lualdi. He could feel her approach long before she dropped into the seat across from him and reached over to pat him on the shoulder. She was pretty as she’d always been, nearly as pretty as his own dame. But only nearly. Nobody was prettier than Alitha. 

“Gamz! I almost thought you weren’t gonna make it! Where’s Lith...?” She twisted around to look for their dame and was frowning when she turned back to him. 

“Ahh, fuck, sis. Some business with the old man, I think. West’s got problems all ‘round, but you all up and knew that.” 

“Fuck, do I, ever. How are you and Li-” 

“Koto,” said a male voice from over her shoulder, “who are you talking to?” 

“There you are!” Kotone twisted around to look at the man standing behind her, and Gamzee’s eyes followed. Tall, wearing a bright red fur jacket, with shockingly white hair and a near permanent bitchy downward twist to his lips. 

“I’m talking to Gamzee,” Kotone continued. “You know Gamzee, right?” 

“The Makara boy?” From the look Atsuko got on his face, he’d clearly sized Gamzee up and found him wanting. “Your shirt’s stained, kid.” 

“Aww, shit, brother, you’re right.” Gamzee grinned up at the adult. “You all up and knowing my dame? She says the same thing all the motherfuckin’ time.” 

“Ah... _yeah_ , Atsu, you know Gamzee’s dame.” 

Atsuko raised an eyebrow at the both of them, slowly inching into the seat next to Kotone. Behind him, Gamzee saw another shock of white hair, longer this time, headed toward them but slowly. He groped around for the name to match the troll for a second before he remembered it: Amatsu, Atsuko’s sire, Grand Highblood of the East. Hadn’t they met once...? Shit, probably. He’d shook so many hands in his short ten sweeps that he just couldn’t be fucked to remember who all of them belonged to. 

“I know Gamzee’s dame?” Atsuko prompted. 

“Yeah,” Kotone was trying to keep her tone light, but Gamzee could see her glancing toward Amatsu out of the corner of her eye. “Yeah, he’s Lith’s.” 

Now, there probably wasn’t actually a word in any language for the shade of lavender Atsuko turned over the course of the next thirty seconds as that information sunk in. A lot brighter than such a pale blood color should be able to accomplish, though, for sure, to the point of looking painful. Gamzee wondered, idly, if Atsuko would be okay with him poking his face to see how cold it was. For science. 

“He’s Alitha’s, is he?” Atsuko said after a little while, voice strained with the effort of trying to keep the tone light. “What’s your name, again, kid? Gamzee, what?” 

“Uh...Makara?” 

Gamzee looked at Kotone for support, and so did Atsuko, but Kotone was now pointedly staring out the nearby window of the train. Bad friend. Worst relative. The look in Atsuko’s one visible eye when Gamzee looked at him, again, having more or less nothing _else_ to look at, suggested that he was thinking pretty much the same thing. After a moment or two, though, the Messiahs were kind: from somewhere in the back of the train, Amatsu called for Atsuko and Kotone, and the two of them beat a quick retreat. The empty seats gave Gamzee a good, clear line of sight on the three Easterners clustered together, whispering and occasionally glancing his way. 

It gave him a good, clear line of sight on Atsuko angrily gesticulating, too, his face somehow turning a deeper and deeper shade of lavender by the moment. 

Gamzee settled in for a nap, still wondering if Atsuko’s face would feel like an ice cube if he poked it. 

*** 

Kotone was, at least, kind enough to come and shake him awake with an urgent promise to come check in on him before the party before she took off alongside Atsuko and Amatsu, their heads still bent together like gossiping swans. Groggy and not half as graceful as those three, even on his best days, Gamzee was the last troll the leave the train. He stepped into the hum and press and cheerfully artificial white lights of the station, blinking at the brightness. He sometimes wondered if making these major train stations so blindingly well-lit was supposed to be some kind of fucking joke on the part of the Peixes Line. He decided, as he merged clumsily into the crowd, that he was going to ask Feferi and let her know that it was the worst joke a motherfucker’d ever lived if she said yes. 

It’d still be a shitty joke if she said no, though. Just about everything was a joke if you turned your head and squinted just right, but not every joke was funny. 

When he finally finished wading through the sea of bodies all trying to escape the station just like he was, Alitha was waiting for him on the sidewalk outside. Well. He assumed she was waiting for him, but it was really hard to tell, because she was clearly arguing about something with Atsuko. He tried to remember if he’d been told how, exactly, Atsuko knew his dame to begin with, but he was all kinds of certain they had never actually told him. Even if they’d told him Atsuko was actually Alitha’s hatchmate and they’d been separated at birth, though, Gamzee still would’ve slid between the two of them. 

He knew his dame was strong. He knew his dame was capable. But he didn’t like males looming over her, and he didn’t like anyone shouting at her, even if it _was_ whisper-shouting. 

“A brother oughta be keepin’ his chill up and on,” he drawled in Atsuko’s apoplectic face, “ain’t we all here to be celebratin’? Gotta be all centered on the _occasion_ , brother.” 

The look that Atsuko gave him could probably boil a rustblood’s marrow, but Gamzee had bathed in fire. What was a glare to him? He just grinned up at the adult, even as his hand came to rest on one of the clubs clipped to his belt. He wasn’t supposed to be armed, technically, and he knew as much, but _technically_ the clubs were juggling pins that he just _happened_ to use to bash in skulls when motherfuckers all up and _fucking forgot to respect his dame_. 

“Wow, look at the time!” Kotone stepped into the midst of the slowly-developing mess and grabbed Atsuko’s arm. “We’re gonna be late for our fitting, Atsu, c’mon. We’ll chat later, Lith.” 

“I’ll call you,” Alitha promised, never breaking eye contact with Atsuko. “When I can. I expect to be busy for some time.” 

“Get _unbusy_ long enough to call us.” Atsuko growled when Kotone tugged on his arm. “I’m serious, Lith.” 

“It doesn’t work like that, and you know it. I will call you when I can. Be content with that.” 

“You know that’s not how I work, sour patch. If I don’t hear from you soon, I will come _find you_.” 

Gamzee was still just a wriggler in most of the ways that counted, and what did wrigglers know of the workings of adults? There was a tension between Atsuko and Alitha, for sure. He would have been stupid to not recognize it. But understanding the mechanics of whatever passed between them, just then, was completely beyond him. All he really knew was that Atsuko had halfway reached for Alitha’s hand, and Alitha had this pinched, painful look on her face, and Gamzee, a good boy, didn’t much like motherfuckers that got under his dame’s skin. 

While Atsuko realistically would have torn Gamzee apart and tossed him around like confetti, Gamzee grouchily told himself that it was the older male's motherfuckin’ luck that Kotone finally managed to tug him away not long after that. 

“Brave of you to meddle like that, boy.” Alitha’s face wasn’t smiling, but her voice was. “Also the Acheron’s doing?” 

“Nah, the river didn’t need to make me not like a motherfucker tryin’ to get big with you. Already up and hated that fuckshit.” 

“Be brave, but be _careful_. You’re not an adult, yet. You could have been hurt.” 

She straightened his collar, and then the lapels of his jacket, and then his cuffs, and then she fussed with his collar, again. A dame’s touch worked fuckin’ miracles on wrinkled clothing; what did trolls that didn’t have one do? Just iron their clothes? Sounded like a lot of fuckin’ work. Sounded unmiraculous, was what. 

“The Highblood and I will likely be late to the debut,” she said, as she smoothed and straightened his clothes. “So it will fall on you to represent the West, at least to start.” 

Anxiety, sharp and sudden and unwanted, coiled in his stomach. It would fall on him. Why did she always put it that way? She was kind enough not to mention that his hands were shaking when they clutched at her wrists, a wriggler grasping for guidance. 

“You’ll be _late_? Shit, ma, you ever been late to anything in your life?” he drawled, surprised that his voice didn’t shake like a leaf, too. 

“A few times. Like this one.” 

Her face softened, and she reached up to ruffle his hair, even though she’d just gotten done fixing it. She kissed his forehead, like she had all those times he’d come to her after bad dreams and bad days when he was little, and it really did seem like everything would be okay, for a moment. 

“You’ll do fine, Gamzee. You’re _my_ boy, aren’t you?” 

He reminded himself, not for the first or last time, that he _was_ hers as much as he was the Old Man’s. He watched Alitha vanish into the crowd, shrinking toward the opposite end of the station from him, and tried to imitate her steel spine and the confident set of her shoulders on his way to meet his ride to the White Palace. The glimpses of himself that he saw in the mirrored windows of the train station looked as much like a stumbling idiot playing pretend as he felt, but other trolls shuffled out of his way like they didn’t usually. 

He was Alitha’s as much as he was Makara’s, he reminded himself. 

He didn’t need to feel it as long as he could imitate it. 

*** 

Everything realigned when Feferi grinned as soon as she saw him. 

She was the center of it all. The heart of the treason they were about to commit, the cause they’d rallied around, _their_ Empress, even if she never ascended. No matter how her tale actually ended, no matter what happened after that party, she was theirs. A lifetime was really just the sum of which parts of yourself you allowed to belong to which people, and Feferi had given them all of the warmth and love and life that she had in her. The throne room he entered in the White Palace belonged to her, and so did anything he could give. 

Gamzee laid the wisdom of the Acheron at his Empress’s feet, and she rose from her throne to throw her arms around him. 

“God I’ve missed you, Gamzee,” she whispered. “Did you watch those vids I sent you? About dancing?” 

“Aw, shit, sis, of course I did. Motherfucker couldn’t let the whole aristocracy see him up and trippin’ over his shoes, could he?” 

“You have to save a dance for me, then. Call it an imperial decree.” 

“Well if it’s all _decreed_ then I’ve gotta, ain’t I?” 

“Of course you do.” He had to bend down to let Feferi pat him on the cheek, but he did it gladly. She lowered her voice even further. “Keep an eye out on the other purples, will you? I didn’t expect Adonis to actually show up.” 

Adonis was over by one of the long tables of refreshments when Gamzee glanced around the room after stepping out of the receiving line. Out of the corner of his eye, the heir of the West watched the Highblood of the North lounge in a chair, eating grapes and holding court with other purples like he wasn’t in someone else’s home. On the opposite side of the room, Amatsu and the other Easterns were still whispering amongst themselves. Gamzee hovered somewhere between both groups and watched the doors for the arrival of his dame and sire, slowly picking at a plate of grapes and cheese that he’d swiped while Adonis was distracted. 

“Hey,” called a voice from behind him, “hey, kid.” 

The female seadweller that seemed to be the one trying to get his attention was...actually not a familiar face. She had more hair than body, and a million little gold studs in her face (maybe not a million, maybe more like six; Gamzee still poked at his own lower lip and wondered how she ate), her fins a few shades more tyrian than Feferi’s. Generally, tyrianbloods were fish he was _supposed_ to recognize, but he wasn’t getting any idea of who this one was by trying for it. 

“You’re Makara’s?” she asked, sipping her wine, and that was around the time Gamzee knew he was going to be in a lot of trouble. 

“By blood and by baptism, sister.” 

“Good. Have a sit down.” 

She pushed a chair directly into the back of his knees, so it wasn’t like he really had a _choice_ in sitting with her. He was beginning to notice that this was kind of a theme with these well-established adults. Not really giving people choices in things. Or at least not giving them _good_ choices. Rude as fuck, was what it was. Rude as _fuck_. 

“You’re friends with Feferi,” the female continued. “I like to meet her friends.” 

“Awful good of a sister to be keepin’ on the up and up, like that.” 

The female stared at him for a few really uncomfortable and awkward heartbeats while she sipped her wine. When she finally laughed, loudly and at him, he almost missed the awkward silence. 

“You have no idea who I am, do you, kid?” 

“Afraid I haven’t been as good about the up and up,” he admitted, “the gears been grindin’ in this skull of mine, but names and faces ain’t ever stickin’ in ‘em like they should.” 

“Good thing we’re having a sit down, then. I can get you on the, ah, “up and up.”” Her voice was edged with mean laughter, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. “I am Skrill Melody. The Duchess. The Galactic Executioner. Whatever you want to call me.” 

Pirates and Grand Highbloods and, somewhere in the crowded room, Admirals. Feferi kept interesting company outside of her inner circle. The more interesting the company got, the more Gamzee wondered how their coup was ever going to happen to begin with. There were only so many trolls whose skulls he could crack before someone cracked _his_. When he met Feferi’s eyes across the room, though, she smiled and waved to Skrill. Shortly after, Sianos made eye contact and began making his way toward the two of them, so maybe everything wasn’t _completely_ fucked. 

Gamzee turned back to Skrill, hoping for answers and finding her deciding to abandon all decorum and just drink wine straight from the bottle, instead. 

“You in on the festivities to come, sister?” he asked her quietly. 

“Of course I am, kid.” If Gamzee hadn’t been looking for it, he never would have noticed Skrill passing Sianos a gun when he kneeled down, all dramatic flair and flamboyancy, to kiss her hand. “I stay on the up and up, remember?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hijinks, extras, deleted scenes, and previews for Homeward are posted over on [I Am Mothfloss](i-am-mothfloss.tumblr.com) ! I can also be found at my main, [Social Media Socrates](socialmediasocrates.tumblr.com)! 
> 
> Comments always appreciated. Deeply. I will love you forever.


End file.
